A year of tempered market expectations, bigger multinationals, taller wood buildings

Three developments tracked since January stand out at year’s end: 1) overall concrete shipments did not pace projected level; 2) among global operators, the annual revenue bar for cement, aggregate and ready mixed concrete shipments is moving from the $10 billion–$15 billion to $15 billion–$20 billion range, with the top players deriving about 20–25 percent of sales in North America; and, 3) U.S. and Canadian wood interests’ multi-story building market pursuits are reverberating among ready mixed and manufactured-concrete producers.

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Teachable moments, cautionary tales from FTC Lafarge, Holcim review file

Last month’s merger forming LafargeHolcim Ltd. expedited transfer of more than $1 billion in cement, concrete and aggregate production and distribution assets in the U.S. and Canada. The Federal Trade Commission justified a decision and order on the sale of those properties per Section 7 of the Clayton Act, a century-old law augmenting the Sherman Act of 1890. It prohibits mergers if “in any line of commerce or in any activity affecting commerce in any section of the country, the effect of such acquisition may be substantially to lessen competition, or to tend to create a monopoly,” FTC notes.

 
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Private equity offer trumps Big Board listing for Hanson Building Products

Germany’s HeidelbergCement AG projects a first quarter closing on the $1.4 billion sale of Hanson Building Products operations in the U.S., Eastern Canada and United Kingdom to an affiliate of Lone Star Funds, a real estate investment-centered private equity firm with Dallas, New York and Frankfurt offices. A definitive agreement on the transaction, announced late last year, superseded a Hanson Building Products Ltd. public offering HeidelbergCement had outlined three months prior in a U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission filing.

 
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